Hawker Lane, Chatswood

Westfield Chatswood’s Hawker Lane food court recently opened, and upon visiting on the first trading weekend, it was already filling up at 11am. The décor takes you right into Asia with cultural architecture and bamboo seatings.

You will not miss the bright Hawker Lane neon light ‘from the fresh food market inside Westfield. But could also be easily accessed through Charlotte Lane, off Anderson Street.

Kayter Co's coconut

Upon entering, I was welcomed with Kayter’s Co’s coconuts, with coconut chocolate toppings would be the only sensible thing to recreate these fresh coconuts to freak coconuts! A sip and we are definitely reminded that summer is here, thirst-quenching water helped refresh our palates for each dish we devoured.

If you spend over $20 at on a meal, make the most of it and claim your free Kayter coconut from the reception desk at the fresh food market!

The food adventure starts at One Tea Grill Express, and get a buzzer as there is about a 25-minute wait. No time wasted, and a quick pop over to Lamb & Cumin for some skewers. The wagyu skewers were tender, seasoned to perfection but such a great soft bite.

The lamb seasoned with cumin was tasty, and was not overpowering. However the tenderness of the wagyu definitely was a winner.

It actually wasn’t long before our buzzer from One Tea went off, and we were welcomed with 3 sliders. I feel like I have been living under a rock, though knowing about ramen burgers, I have never actually had one. I know, what is this blasphemy!?

The pan-fried ramen had a great crunch, the beef was juicy but what I loved most was the kick in the sauce. A little messy and definitely one that is hard to tackle when fresh with the burning heat from the ramen.

The chicken burger had a nice and soft mantou bun, the chicken could have been a little crispier, but there was that same spicy kick in it and had allowed me to forget the loss of crisp in the chicken.

If you order the matcha mantou burger with your meal you may need to tackle your burgers quick smart as you wouldn’t want your ice cream to melt too much. We nomed our burgers as quick, the mantou bun is deep fried to a tee, giving enough of a crunchy bite before getting into the soft insides. What is matcha without it’s partner in crime, red bean – a small circle of red bean paste sits on top of the ice cream.

Laksa from Jim’s Malaysian gave a great kick, but I totally love how tofu puffs soaks up the soup. I love the way the soup bursts once you take that first bite.

Curry puff, also from Jim’s Malaysian, reminded me of Albee’s curry puff, only a smaller version. The barbecue pork pastry had a generous amount of meat inside and held all sweet flavours with every bite into the flakey pastry.

Despite the dishes being only sample sizes, my stomach was telling me that it had enough food already. But there was so much more I wanted to try! We can not pass fried chicken when we see it, so an 8-inch fried chicken with thai sweet sauce was ordered from Cheers Cut. While the chicken is not as juicy as Hot Star, the sweet sauces were a great compliment to the fried goodness.

A nice refreshing drink from Gong Cha helped me feel like I could conquer a tiny bit more food…

Pork rice paper rolls from Madame Nhu were tasty; the pork was soft and had enough flavour. However it would have given a great hit if they had offered some sauce.

And because we can, we dropped by Aqua S for their Royal Milk tea, which tastes just like bubble tea, only without the pearls. Not seen underneath was the lemon tea, while it was not as smooth in texture; it was definitely bringing the citrus tea. It’s a battle of the teas.

It seems Chatswood is the place to be with their new food district in Interchange and now Westfield’s new Hawker Lane. Would you be visiting Chatswood soon?

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JFW attended as a guest to sample Hawker Lane’s restaurant. However, all comments are based on JFW’s own opinion.

Thanks to Julia from Sibling Agency and Westfield Chatswood for the invite.